In recent years, large numbers of bills are being handled in banks, major retailers and the like on a daily basis, and a business has been present which classifies and arranges these bills in accordance with money types and wearing states (degrees of damage of the bills). Usually, when the volume of the bills increases, the bills are managed in a state where they are bound with bundling tape every 100 bills. As an apparatus which automates such an arrangement business of the bills, a bill handling apparatus has been suggested. This bill handling apparatus includes a hopper section which stacks and receives unclassified bills, a conveyance mechanism which takes out and conveys the bills one by one from this hopper section, an inspecting section which inspects types and damage degrees of the conveyed bills, a plurality of pocket sections which classify and accumulate the inspected bills in accordance with the money types or the like, and an accumulating and strapping apparatus which straps the accumulated bills, for example, every 100 bills.
The accumulating and strapping apparatus comprises two accumulation devices which accumulate the bills every 100 bills, and a strapping module provided under the accumulation devices. The two accumulation devices are arranged side by side in parallel. Further, the accumulating and strapping apparatus includes a conveyance mechanism which conveys the accumulated bills to the strapping module. This conveyance mechanism is movably up and down provided on each accumulation device, and includes a first carrier which conveys the accumulated bills in upward and downward directions, and second carriers provided movably in a horizontal direction. The second carriers receive a bill bundle from the first carrier, convey and transfer the bundle to the strapping module.
In the accumulating and strapping apparatus constituted as described above, the two accumulation devices are arranged side by side in parallel, and the two second carriers are arranged. Therefore, a large installation space is required, which easily makes the accumulating and strapping apparatus large. Furthermore, the two second carriers and the first carrier independently operate, and hence the operation of the accumulating and strapping apparatus becomes complicated, which impedes speedup.